View full sizeThomas Boyd/The OregonianCorrectional officers give a tour of death row and the death house at the Oregon State Penitentiary, April 9, 2009, in Salem, Oregon. The gurney sits ready for the next execution.

Gary Haugen, an inmate sentenced to Oregon's death row for the 2003 killing of a fellow prisoner, is expected to waive all future appeals of his death sentence at a hearing Friday in a move that could clear the way for Oregon's first execution since 1997.

Haugen, who has written letters in recent weeks saying he wants to drop any appeals and expressing his "disgust" with the judicial system, is scheduled to appear before Marion County Circuit Judge Joseph Guimond for a death-warrant hearing.

Despite Haugen's letters, it remains to be seen what actually happens on Friday at the death-warrant hearing, which was scheduled after the state Supreme Court issued its decision affirming Haugen's death sentence. Under Oregon law, the court automatically reviews all death-penalty cases.

"It's not cut and dried that because Mr. Haugen has said he does not wish to pursue appeals in the past that he will not or cannot change his mind," said Phillip Lemman, a spokesman for the Oregon Judicial Department.

But if he does waive his appeals and the judge issues a death warrant, an execution would be scheduled to take place between 90 days and 120 days after April 19 -- the effective date of the Supreme Court's affirmation.

Haugen was initially imprisoned for the 1981 murder of his former girlfriend's mother in Northeast Portland. In 1999, he volunteered to donate half of his liver to save his dying sister. Under testing, however, he was found not to be a good donor match.

Haugen and another defendant were then convicted in 2007 of the murder four years earlier of fellow inmate David Polin. The state argued that the two men killed Polin, a former Hillsboro resident who was serving time for attempted murder and drug convictions, because they suspected he had snitched on their drug use to prison officials.

Co-defendant Jason Brumwell was also sentenced to death for the fatal attack, in which Polin suffered a crushed skull and 84 stab wounds.

The state has not executed anyone since 1996 and 1997 when it put to death two men, Douglas Franklin Wright and Harry Charles Moore who both waived appeals. They were executed by lethal injection.

Besides Haugen, there are 34 men and one woman on Oregon's death row.

An earlier version of this story misstated the time period in which the execution must take place.